These months are just flying by… it’s so hard to believe it’s already July. Canada day has come and gone, and we’re moving steadily through our JRPG craziness. Last month, we talked about E3, previewed a few of the spring shows I’d been watching, and started the Spring anime reviews as series started to wrap things up. The first three were The Lost Village, Asterisk War’s second season, and Re:Zero – Starting Life in Another World. We also unveiled two more entries in the Shadow’s Sixty! We’re in the home stretch now, with only 3 more lists to go as we have counted down to 19 now. We should be wrapping this up over the next two months, as we unveil the top 18 games of all time in my eyes!

But before we jump into more of what is to come from this month, let’s start off with the biggie: Ai-Kon is happening in just two weeks. From July 15th to 17th, anime will be invading the Winnipeg Convention Centre in downtown Winnipeg and I’ll be there to capture all of the amazing cosplay that will inevitably show up. While there was some disappointing news that my favourite voice actress had cancelled her appearance there due to scheduling conflicts, the event still promises to be as enjoyable as ever, with a fairly solid lineup of guests and, hopefully, as friendly an atmosphere as always. Expect pictures from there, and hopefully soon after the event.

In other good news, my photos from my Vancouver trip are coming along nicely. They took a while, as I took nearly 1600 pictures, but it’s looking like there will be close to 200 usable shots from the trip that we can touch up and publish for you all to enjoy soon! The first set of pictures, 90 in total, are available for viewing in the new Vancouver 2016 gallery!

Now that we have that out of the way, let’s talk about the other big deal for this month… the Spring anime season has ended! We already, as I mentioned above, have 3 shows out of the way and reviewed. I’ve also finished watching a couple of other shows – Hundred and Kiznaiver – and hope to get reviews out of them in short order. The other shows I’m currently looking to get finished are Bungo Stray Dogs, Anne-Happy, Big Order, High School Fleet, and Twin Star Exorcists… however there are a couple of other shows I’ve been intermittently watching over the season that I may decide to review. Ideally, I’m hoping to have the lot of these done before Ai-Kon, but that’s probably being really optimistic!

And if all of that wasn’t enough, we also are smack in the middle of the JRPG summer craziness. I just finished Atelier Sophie, so expect a review of that fairly soon as well… but we’re also playing Odin Sphere Leifthrasir and Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness. We also have I Am Setsuna, Fairy Fencer f: Advent Dark Force, and Toukiden 2 coming this month. Additionally, I’d like to make some time for Grand Kingdom, Mighty No 9, Song of the Deep, and one or two other games… naturally, I’m not going to have time for all of them this month. But we’ll try to get through as much as we can! I’m currently streaming Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness, so if you’re curious to see what it’s about, check out my stream sometime! Finally, while we’re talking about the stream, my July Selubration is set for July 30. Mark your calendars, book the day off work(okay that might be going a bit far), and go here to vote for what I’m going to play!

July is going to be amazing. And I don’t see this gaming craziness stopping anytime soon, so we’re in for a long, busy, and amazing ride. I hope you have a good month, and sound off in the comments if you’re planning to attend Ai-Kon – maybe we can meet up.